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Fog computing gathers momentum

April 13, 201617:04Stuart Corner

Photo: Ian Britton http://www.freefoto.com

The OpenFog Consortium, the body founded by Cisco in November 2015 to develop standards around edge computing (which Cisco refer to as fog computing), has formed an affiliation with the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), garnered 17 new members, formed its first country team in Japan and released a white paper on an OpenFog architecture.

The OpenFog Consortium says these developments, along with the addition of representatives from GE and Schneider Electric to its board — both companies have joined the consortium as contributing members — signify the rapid growth and market interest in fog computing.

“The new members are leaders in fog computing research and technologies and will support OpenFog’s work to create an open reference architecture for fog computing that supports intelligence at the edge of an end-to-end IoT solution,” the consortium said.

The Forum said its affiliation with IEEE, through the IEEE Communications Society would “co-create and co-promote fog networking concepts and architectures and collaborate on marketing, education and standards initiatives.”

Helder Antunes, chairman of the Open Fog Consortium, said: “This collaborative agreement with IEEE brings together a plethora of skills and experience that will lead to significant advancements in fog technology. We anticipate more rapid progression towards our goal of establishing open architectures, along with education around best practices that will lead to industry innovation.”

In Japan, Sakura Internet, the first contributing member from Asia will support a new Japan Country Committee along with new influencing members Toshiba and Fujitsu. Sakura Internet fellow, Osamu Ogasahara, said: “Sakura Internet is committed to contributing to the creation of new models such as the standardisation of the data marketplace of the future along with its focus on Internet infrastructures.”

White paper released

In February the organisation released its OpenFog architecture white paper. It provides an overview of fog computing, sets out four industry scenarios and details on the eight pillars in an OpenFog architecture: security; scalability; open; autonomy; programmability; RAS (reliability, availability, and serviceability); agility; and hierarchy.

Following its release, the Consortium formed workgroups to address fog computing issue in communication, security, testbeds, manageability and software infrastructure.

The new board members are Greg Petroff, chief experience officer at GE Digital; Pascal Brosset, senior vice president of strategy & technology, Schneider Electric Global Solutions; Dr Douglas N Zuckerman, IEEE Communications Society past president and an IEEE life fellow; and Dr Russell Hsing, chair professor of National Chiao Tung University in Taiwan and an IEEE life fellow.